


Better Than Me

by GraveVyxen



Category: Until Dawn (Video Game)
Genre: F/M, Implied Relationships, Implied Sexual Content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-16
Updated: 2015-10-16
Packaged: 2018-04-26 14:33:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,143
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5008429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GraveVyxen/pseuds/GraveVyxen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Even if she didn't realize it, Josh always knew Sam deserved better.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Better Than Me

**Author's Note:**

> TITLE: Better Than Me  
> CHARACTERS: Josh Washington, Sam, mentions Chris, Beth Washington, and Hannah Washington  
> PAIRINGS: implied non-romantic Josh/Sam  
> NOTES: Completely inspired by 'Better Than Me' by Hinder.  
> DISCLAIMER: Not my characters.

How did it all end up this way? And why? Why had he let himself fall this far?

It wasn't Sam's fault. He knew it wasn't Sam's fault. He'd made her tell her story, over and over, after that night; so many times, so many, it made him sick.

She'd tried to stop the prank. That stupid, stupid prank. She'd tried to get there first, because of all the people in the world, she'd loved his little sisters almost as much as he did.

Hannah...Beth...sometimes Josh couldn't really believe that they'd ever gone missing. Hell, sometimes he still expected them to come through the front door at midnight, sneaking in with muddy shoes and made-up faces, trying to hide the sound of keys jingling as they hung them by the door, before their parents could find out that their precious girls went out after curfew.

But it had been six months. It was summer now. And the search had been called off.

Hearing that news might have been what finally pushed Josh to this edge. Skipping his psych appointments, flushing his pills, cutting class...he didn't even have the points or the grades to pass. Summer school was rearing its ugly head. Not that that mattered. Not that he even cared anymore. He'd long ago stopped caring about graduating.

Josh had fallen so far behind his friends after the accident. He wondered if they even cared. Only Sam and Chris seemed to show it. The others...the others all had their own things to worry about. Dates. Boyfriends. Girlfriends. Break ups. Who cheated on who and why.

When did their lives become so trivial?

Josh remembered a time when that was all he cared about, too. When all he worried about was if he looked presentable enough to catch the attention of the girls at school. When he stressed over a date on Saturday night.

When he and Sam would sneak around together and try not to get caught.

Before he ruined everything. Before he pushed her away. Before he realized just how wrong he was for her.

See, Sam was good. She was a good girl. She had a wild side, sure, and she loved the rush she'd get when they convinced her parents and his that she was staying the night with the twins, and the two of them would sneak her into his room. Even if they never got down to anything, just being able to sleep next to each other, knowing that it was a secret, was enough for them.

But Sam was good, and she deserved better than him. Josh knew that. He'd always known that. She was too good for someone like him, someone that needed to take medication daily just to be deemed 'normal' to society, someone that couldn't even work up the nerve to ask her out.

She never seemed to care, never asked for more from him than his time, his kisses. Never asked for a date, or a commitment, or even an acknowledgement in public. Because she was a good girl.

Josh, though, Josh was a fuck up. He knew it. He always knew that she shouldn't be with him. That she should find someone to treat her right. Someone who could hold her hand in public and tell everyone that they were together.

But he'd kept her selfishly to himself, with no promise of a future; just a casual 'for fun' relationship based on mutual affection, and sometimes based on sex.

And then his sisters disappeared, and everything changed. There were no more sleepovers. No more quiet murmurs in his dark bedroom. No more Sam in his house. He supposed he should blame himself. He lost the drive to sneak around after that. He was more worried about his sisters, if they would find Hannah and Beth again, how cold they must be on that freezing mountain.

Sam never stopped pursuing him, though, trying to help him by talking about it. He had psychologists for that, though, and they didn't talk back to him. They didn't try to hold his hand or sugarcoat his worries. They let him rage, they let him cry, and they let him talk openly about how much he'd fucked up by letting things go too far.

When Sam tried to convince him to talk to her, she always tried to downplay his fear and his anger, tried to calm him before he could really explode, and Josh couldn't take it. He started lying to her. Telling her he was okay. Telling her that the pills and the psychs were helping. Telling her that he was getting better.

Josh wondered if she could tell he was faking it. If she could, she never showed it. Instead, Josh turned their would-be heart-to-hearts into heated make-outs. Hands in her shirt, in her hair, to distract her from asking more questions. A way to blow off the steam he built up worrying for Hannah and Beth.

But then the search was called off. And Josh realized, as summer was starting, that this was the first year he wouldn't spend it at the cabin; he wouldn't spend the warm months playing baseball on the lawn. The first summer he wouldn't spend with his family. His parents, in their own way of mourning, decided that a cruise would be the way to go. And Josh, well, he was about to start summer school, to try and make it into a university before fall came. He knew full-well that he didn't intend to finish his classes, though. What was the point, when his whole life was already falling apart?

When the search ended, Josh went into hiding. He barely left his bedroom, and he'd turned his phone off. He didn't want to talk to anyone. He couldn't even drag himself out of bed most days.

Chris would come over sometimes, try to get him to go out and do something, but Josh always had an excuse, and Chris got tired of trying.

Sam was the only one that didn't want to give up, not at first, because she thought she could help. She tried everything she could think of, tried to talk to him about the whole thing, before Josh finally snapped.

What was wrong with him? Why did he have to tell her off like that?

When Josh screamed at her to leave him alone, that he never wanted to see her again, Sam listened. Silently, she'd backed out of his life, and once again, Josh found himself all alone with his thoughts. The same way that he'd been before she came into the picture.

He'd gotten what he wanted, or at least, what he _thought_ he wanted, and in a way, it was good for Sam. Because she was a good girl, and she deserved so much better than him.


End file.
